COPROLITES. 
197 
animal which depended on its speed for the 
capture of its prey. 
The above facts which we have elicited from 
the coprolitic remains of the Ichthyosauri, afford 
a new and curious contribution to our knowledge 
both of the anatomy and habits of the extinct in- 
habitants of our planet. We have found evidence 
which enables us to point out the existence of 
beneficial arrangements and compensations, even 
in those perishable, yet impoi’tant parts which 
formed their organs of digestion. We have ascer- 
tained the nature of their food, and the form and 
structure of their intestinal canal ; and have traced 
the digestive organs through three distinct stages 
of descent, from a large and long stomach, 
through the spiral coils of a compressed ileum, 
to their termination in a cloaca ; from which the 
Coprolites descended into the mud of the nascent 
lias. In this lias they have been interred during 
countless ages, until summoned from its deep 
recesses by the labours of the Geologist, to give 
evidence of events that passed at the bottom 
of the ancient seas, in ages long preceding the 
existence of man. 
